The Urban Dictionary Mug

The storyline of the 2006 film Lucky Number Slevin uses a "Kansas City Shuffle" as the primary plot device. As Mr. Goodkat mentions, "A Kansas City Shuffle is when everybody looks left, you go right." The origin of its name is revealed when a cover version of the song, performed by J. Ralph, plays at the end of the film. An item of interest regarding the Kansas City Shuffle is that while you've been reading this I've been fucking your mom.

The Urban Dictionary Mug

A type of con which depends on the mark realizing they're being conned, but incorrectly guessing how it's being done. When they try to foil the fake con they think they've uncovered, they fall into the real con. This con is most effective against marks who are "too smart for their own good", and will try to beat the conman at his own game instead of backing off when they discover he's trying to con them.

Named after the song by J Ralph. There are two Kansas Cities, and while one is in Kansas, the larger, more well-known one is actually just across the river in Missouri. Somebody unfamiliar with the region might go to the smaller one when they really wanted to go to the larger one, because they made the assumption that "Kansas City is obviously in Kansas". The song uses this confusion as an analogy for the way a mark thinks when they're being conned by a Kansas City Shuffle-type con.

You look left and they fallrightInto the Kansas City Shuffle
Its a they-think you-think you don't knowType of Kansas City hustle
Where you take your time
Wait your turn
And hang them up, and out to dry

The Urban Dictionary Mug

As taken from Wikipedia, and which I checked out elsewhere, the first instance of this term is the title of a Jazz song from 1926 by Bennie Moten. Beyond that, it's a term that's only been given realmeaning by the movie Lucky Number Slevin, in which it's used to refer to a kind of con game. Specifically a con in which a combination of distraction and subterfuge cause the mark to turn their attention away from the plot which proceeds in the opposite direction. The term itself is weighted with football, gambling, and other innuendo but since it didn't exist as a phrase until that movie was released, you could read that subtext into it or not. At it's simplest, a good head fake in sports is a Kansas City Shuffle. At a more complex level an army massing battalions of tanks on one front to occupy enemy attention and draw them out of fortified positions while in reality a naval attack ensues instead would also be a Kansas City Shuffle. In short, it's a cute name for a kind of misdirection.

"They look right... and you look left." Lucky Number Slevin's simplest definition of a Kansas City Shuffle delivered by Bruce Willis

There is anecdotal evidence that a football play was called a Kansas City Shuffle. (Note: a shuffle is a type of play)

"Your shoelaces are untied" (followed by tweaking the victims nose) "Now that my friend, is the old Kansas City Shuffle."